WIP: 16 Piece Sunburst in Curly Bubinga

[Mike Henderson]

Here's a table that I'm working on for a client. It's an antique and they wanted the veneer replaced with a 16 piece sunburst. They chose curly bubinga, which is a difficult veneer to deal with, especially with water based glue. But it really makes a dramatic show - I very much like the look of curly bubinga.

The second picture is a close up of the center of the table top, but the color in the picture is a bit off.

As shown here, the top has been shot with sanding sealer. I'll lightly sand it, then shoot lacquer as the final finish.

Mike

[That white mark in the first picture is just a reflection.]
[WIP = Work In Progress]

[John Keeton]

Wowwwwww!!!! Nice looking stuff - makes me rethink my hesitancy on exotics.

[Jon Grider]

Beautiful, that close up pic reminds me of a kaleidoscope.

[Gene Howe]

Verrrry nice!

[Dan Friedrichs]

Mike,

How do you get the pieces glued in place so precisely? Any special trick?

[Chris Kennedy]

That is amazing! The effect is striking, to say the least.

I don't work with veneers, so please pardon my ignorance. What made the bubinga difficult to work with compared to others?

Cheers,

Chris

[Brian Kent]

How are you edging that table, Mike?

[Mike Henderson]

Curly bubinga is rotary cut, which means you're working with wood in the maximum direction of expansion (wood expands more along the "face" and less along the quarter cut). And curly bubinga really expands when it gets wet.

Then you have a sunburst, which has more wood on the outside of each segment (pie shaped piece) than on the inside. So if you took one segment and wet it, it would expand more in the big part of the segment than in the small part of the segment.

When laid in a sunburst, this means that if the sunburst gets wet, the outside gets longer and the sunburst warps like a potato chip.

The first time I tried to press it, I used a water based glue and the glue up was a disaster. Before I could get it in press, it made like a potato chip and there was no way it would lay flat.

What I did the second time was use epoxy glue because it doesn't have any water in it. There are some issues with epoxy but it came out fine.

Mike

[Mike Henderson]

How are you edging that table, Mike?
No edging. The veneer is brought out to the outside and trimmed off flush, as shown in the picture. I know the veneer can chip but that's the way the old veneer was and that's what they wanted.

Mike

[Mike Henderson]

Mike,

How do you get the pieces glued in place so precisely? Any special trick?
You lay up a sunburst prior to pressing it. The segments are cut with a template, and you cut all 16 pieces at one time. The pieces must be sequential and you must keep track of the sequence. Describing how to do it fully would take a long time. There's a sequence you use to minimize the difference between any two pieces, and every alternate piece is flipped so it's bookmatched with its neighbor.

When you go to press, you have the veneer exactly as shown there, but taped up with veneer tape on the show side. You put glue on the substrate, lay the veneer on the substrate, tape it to the substrate (on the outside) to keep it from moving, and get it in press.

Mike

[Jim Tobias]

Mike,
Very nice sunburst!! I can imagine how tedious that process must have been. I have done numerous sunburst and a 16 piece figured bubinga is a difficult, but the reward is in the final result!!

Jim

[Barry Richardson]

That is COOL! Very fine craftsmanship! I don't know much about veneering, but I'm assuming you made that from a pre cut flitch? I'm amazed the grain pattern is so uniform all the way around. I figured the pattern would change more through the successive layers of veneer.

[Wilbur Pan]

That is just jawdroppingly incredibly great work. I can only imagine what it will be like when it's done.

[richard poitras]

Mike, looking good as always! :cool:

If I may ask where did you buy your radial templates from to make the sunburst? I have been wanting to get a set, not sure if I want the 10, 12, 16 or all three. I just got a packet of veneer in the other day consisting of some ebony, santos, kerlian, bubinga, birds eye, lace, eucalyptus, quilted maple, pommele, sapeles, and tamo ash (small gloat $60.00) and wanting to try a star burst.

Thanks Richard

[jim gossage]

absolutely spectacular

[Mike Henderson]

Mike, looking good as always! :cool:

If I may ask where did you buy your radial templates from to make the sunburst? I have been wanting to get a set, not sure if I want the 10, 12, 16 or all three. I just got a packet of veneer in the other day consisting of some ebony, santos, kerlian, bubinga, birds eye, lace, eucalyptus, quilted maple, pommele, sapeles, and tamo ash (small gloat $60.00) and wanting to try a star burst.

Thanks Richard
You can purchase acrylic patterns from Paul Schurch (http://www.schurchwoodwork.com/tools/index.html) (about $65) but you can make them yourself. I have a tutorial and spreadsheet here (http://www.mikes-woodwork.com/Tutorials.htm) with the information on how to make them (I'm definitely too cheap to buy them). One of these days I'll have to do a tutorial on laying a sunburst.

If you're going to do sunbursts, you'll also need a hinged mirror. Or I should say that a hinged mirror will allow you to better decide where to cut the packet of veneer to achieve the best "look".

Mike

[Mike Henderson]

That is COOL! Very fine craftsmanship! I don't know much about veneering, but I'm assuming you made that from a pre cut flitch? I'm amazed the grain pattern is so uniform all the way around. I figured the pattern would change more through the successive layers of veneer.
I'm not sure what you mean but "pre-cut flitch". If you mean I bought a stack of veneer instead of cutting my own, yes, that's true. If you mean I bought a stack of veneer cut into wedges, no, that's not correct.

The grain pattern is decent on this sunburst. The pattern does change through the stack and when doing a sunburst, you like to find a stack where the first and last pieces are pretty close.

Often the grain "drifts" across the pieces so when you're preparing the stack, you want to align the pattern directly up and down, even though this means the stack is shifted over a bit each piece. If you don't do this, the pattern will not line up after you cut it.

In my opinion, sunbursts are one of the more difficult veneering tasks but can provide a very showy piece.

Mike

[Don Morris]

When I first saw it all I said was "Wow". Now I want to work with some. Beautiful work.

[gary Zimmel]

Stunning top Mike! Absolutely stunning.

[Todd Burch]

Mike, you are an awesome craftsman and I admire all of your work.

But that's got to be the ugliest table I've ever seen in my life! GROSS!

I'm a major fan of curly bubinga. Love it. But that is one way-too-busy top.

Todd

[Mike Henderson]

Mike, you are an awesome craftsman and I admire all of your work.

But that's got to be the ugliest table I've ever seen in my life! GROSS!

I'm a major fan of curly bubinga. Love it. But that is one way-too-busy top.

Todd
I understand your comment, Todd. It actually looks pretty good in person. The pictures don't really convey the way it looks when you're standing right next to it. The color is a rich burgundy. Design wise, it's not much different than a crotch mahogany sunburst (which was on it originally). Also, remember that a table like this is used, which means that there are things on it so you don't see the whole table like you do here.

And it's what the customer wanted.

But different people like different things.

Mike

[David Hostetler]

Wow,

I've never seen "curly" bubinga before. I had an old electric bass guitar with a Bubinga body and Bubinga / Wengle / Maple / purpleheart neck. I sold it as I never could get used to a 5 stringer... But it sure was pretty... Given that grain of the curly bubinga, that is downright amazing...

The old saying that that looks like a million bucks doesn't do it justice. Adjusted for inflation I would say $1B U.S.

[richard poitras]

Mike, thanks for the info. and the tutorials.

Richard

[Mike Henderson]

No one asked me why the clients wanted to remove the old veneer and put this veneer on. The answer is that the substrate, which is 3/4" mahogany, split from shrinkage of old age - which of course split the veneer. I sanded off the old veneer, patched the split with epoxy glue, the put a cross band of mahogany veneer on the table top. Then laid the bubinga sunburst.

Mike

[Greg Crawford]

That has got to one of the most spectacular pieces of woodworking I've seen! It sure has ugly legs though ;-)

I'd love to see a tutorial posted, as I can get some veneer very cheap, and I could practice with it. Like some of the others said, you are making me want to do some veneering, too.

[jim carter]

very nice . makes me want to break out a 1" x 4" x 16" piece of bubinga ive had for at least 5 years that i paid $3.00 for. nowhere near as nice as yours but its nice.

[Jeffrey Makiel]

Mike,
That is a fantastic look! Wow!
-Jeff :)

[Larry Fox]

Mike - that is extraordinary. Waterfall Bubinga is my definite favorite. Instead of the WB glue, did you consider trying Unibond? I have been using it lately and have really grown to like it.

[Mike Henderson]

Mike - that is extraordinary. Waterfall Bubinga is my definite favorite. Instead of the WB glue, did you consider trying Unibond? I have been using it lately and have really grown to like it.
I used it in a veneer class I took a while back. The only negative I see to it is the relatively short shelf life, especially as the storage temperature rises. In fact, at the school, one of the gallons had spoiled (it gets really thick), and they use a fair amount of it.

But for a job like this, it would have been good. Not only is it not water based, but they have an additive that reduces bleed through. I should have bought Unibond 800 and the additive for this job. Next time....

Mike

[Mike Henderson]

Just to close this thread off, here's a couple of pictures of the finished table, including one with the clients, Penny and Jack. They were pleased with the way it came out - and so was I!

Mike

[The final finish is lacquer which I rubbed out.]

[Thomas S Stockton]

Mike
Even though unibond is not waterbased it will cause the veneer to expand somewhat because their is liquid in it. I had an old shopmate that was inlaying a chess board that was raw veneers into and already laid up and pressed surface, He had gotten the board to fit perfectly and pressed it up and when it got out of the press it had expanded and run up over the other surface. It wasn't more than about an 1/8" but enough That he had to add some other inlay to hide it.
I've not had problems with gluing pie shaped veneer top using titebond, I usually do the show face last so it doesn't have as much time to misbehave. The problem I had was letting a taped up top sit a week before pressing and the weather changed from dry to wet and I some gaps open up that I had to rejoint.
Tom

[Todd Burch]

Mike, the finished product does indeed look better than the interim picture. And, best of all, you're clients are glowing! Well done.

Todd

[Bill White]

Nahhhhh! Ya didn't REALLY expect us to believe that you did that, did ya? Huh?
That's incredible.
Bill ;)

[Scot Ferraro]

Hi Mike,

That is a great looking table -- very nice job on the veneering!! Well done.

Scot

[Peter Scoma]

Do you rub out your lacquer finishes with pumice and rottenstone after spraying Mike?

PS

[Mike Henderson]

No, first I lightly power sand it with P320 grit sandpaper (with a variable ROS on the slowest speed). This removes any orange peel that I might have left from spraying. Then I rub it out with that white auto polishing compound. I rubbed this table out by hand but I have use power buffing in the past. If I power buff it, I usually do a hand rubbing as a final.

I like to leave the finish set for a day or more before rubbing it out, but I often do it the same day and it works okay.

Mike

[If you don't want to sand the finish (maybe you're afraid you'll sand through the finish), you can do the initial rub out with steel wool lubricated with mineral oil. But sanding with a ROS is faster and less physical.]